WRI activists

It is with deep regret and sorrow that Gays and Lesbians of Zimbabwe (GALZ) informs all our friends and partners of the passing away of our Director - Keith Goddard, one of the champions for the struggle for lesbians, gay men, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) peoples rights in Zimbabwe.

Later this year WRI will have a postal ballot on changing the constitution. However, the processes of electing a chair and Council needs to start before then. Therefore, these elections will take place under the existing constitution. The election for chair will therefore take place by postal ballot, and the elections for Council at the business meeting (27-28 January) to be held during the international conference in Ahmedabad, India next year.

On 26 April 2009, five members of WRI's Israeli affiliate New Profile were detained by Israeli police, their homes raided, and their computers, and also computers of partners, seized. Among those detained was also Sergeiy Sandler, a member of the WRI Council and Executive Committee. All those detained were interrogated at Ramat Hachiyal police station in the Yarkon Region of the police. After the interrogation, all five were released, but only after agreeing to bail conditions which do not allow them to contact each other in the coming thirty days.

Ralph DiGia died on 1 February,
2008, at the age of 93.  A Second World War conscientious objection,
Ralph had been one of the prisoners who went on hunger strike to end
racial segregation in prisons.  On his release, he was one of the
generation of radical pacifists who transformed the War Resisters
League and pioneered the use of nonviolent direct action in the USA, on
issues of war preparation (such as civil defence drills) and on racial
segregation. 

This afternoon, February 1st, I got a call from Ruth Benn that Ralph DiGia, 93, had died at St. Vincent’s here in New York City. I had visited him this past Saturday and sensed he was losing his battle - he had fallen and broken a hip about two weeks ago, got an infection in the hospital (hospitals in the US are notoriously dangerous places for the sick and wounded to go!), and despite rallying several times, died.

Grace Paley, the American short-story writer and pacifist, has died aged 84.

24 December 1919 - 3 February 2007

Len Gibson, a lifelong peace campaigner and member of The Brotherhood Church -- a WRI affiliate in West Yorkshire, England -- has died at age 87.

15 February 1926 - 15 December 2006

Jean Van Lierde, who died in Brussels on 15 December, was the main figure behind the long political struggle for the recognition of the right to CO in Belgium, which resulted in 1964 in the law creating alternative civilian service. He was a friend and adviser to Patrice Lumumba, the Congo's first post-independence prime minister, and published several books and articles on Lumumba.

Harry Mister died in London on 26 January, just a fortnight after his 92nd birthday. Harry was a key figure in many parts of the peace movement including, but not only, the pacifist end of the movement - for over 70 years.

The War Resisters' International was formed in reaction to the senseless slaughter of World War I with a mission not only to oppose all war but also to strive to eradicate its causes. This ambitious programme introduced a new and political dimension to the existing moral and religious basis of pacifism. It attracted some of the best pacifist thinkers and activists from around the world - George Lansbury, Bertrand Russell, Bayard Rustin, Martin Niemoeller, Danilo Dolci, and Mahatma Gandhi.

17 August 1939 - 13 July 2004

Today we heard that Toma Ŝik is dead - overrun by a tractor during a nightly walk home through the fields to his newly-bought old farm somewhere in a forgotten part of Hungary which should have fulfilled his dream of establishing a commune of organic-humanist (and vegan) "new peasants".

He was a pioneer of the Israeli-Palestinian search for peace, a forerunner of the present day pacifist-refusniks and actively involved in many struggles. For decades his friendly bearded face was to be seen at any demonstration.

Tony Smythe